1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the fields of separation technology and chemical- and bio-reactor technology and more particularly to continuous methods and apparatus employing endless belts of resilient, open-cell foam polymers such that diffusion and resin capacity are not limiting factors in mass transfer between phases.
2. Separations by Sorption Resins
The separation and purification of chemicals by selective sorption on solid material has been known from ancient times when wine and olive oil were filtered through charcoal to remove impurities. Materials science has created a great variety of porous, organic and inorganic materials with large internal surface areas and with functional groups designed for selective sorption of chemicals according to their specific physical and chemical properties. Industrially useful solute sorption processes include: adsorption to surfaces by non-specific London/van der Waals forces, as with charcoal; electrostatic attraction of charged ions to oppositely charged functional groups, as on ion-exchange resins; interaction of hydrophobic regions of molecules with hydrocarbon pendant groups on resins; attraction of metal-dependent enzyme proteins to atoms of those metals held to resins by chelation or coordination; hydrogen bonding of proteins and nucleic acids through the interaction with polar oxygen- and nitrogen-containing groups on resins; and biospecific affinity of proteins to substrates, cofactors, antibodies, antigens, receptors, toxins or biomimetic dyes bound to resins.